For years farmers have attempted to create trenches in the ground to guide farm equipment when they are planting row crops such as corn, sunflowers, soybeans, cabbage, cauliflower, celery, sugar beets, and the like. These trenches are subsequently used to guide the front wheels of the tractor when the farmer is engaged in cultivating operations or chemical application operations subsequent to planting. The trenches are used to guide the front wheels of the tractor so that the standard spacing of the row crops can be anticipated in carrying out subsequent cultivation and chemical application operations.
Unfortunately, previous methods for forming these trenches have been inadequate to maximize farming efficiency.
Initially, farmers used a chisel type device to rip two parallel trenches in the soil during planting operations. The implement used to rip the trenches in the soil was attached to the planter or an implement attached to the implement attachment bar behind the tractor. Unfortunately, the resulting trenches were disruptive to the soil surface and were believed to result in increased soil moisture loss through evaporation. In addition, the ripped trenches were often filled in or eroded by heavy winds or rain. Furthermore, these trenches did not provide very substantial tracks for the tractor wheels to follow.
Subsequently, implements were developed to provide a wheel which followed each of the chisel-type devices. The wheel was used to roll over the disrupted ground in order to leave a somewhat more consistent trench. However, moisture loss from the disrupted soil surface in the trenches was still believed to be a problem and trenches created by such implements continue to erode when exposed to heavy rainfall and/or heavy winds.
Furthermore, both methods are subject to inefficiencies due to operator errors which create deviations from a straight-line path in the planted rows and the trenches. Operator errors often occur when the operator allows the tractor to "drift" toward or away from the previously planted row adjacent to the farmer's present planting position. Operators generally use a locked hitch when planting because they are especially concerned about accuracy. Because the object is to plant substantially parallel rows, the operator will generally turn the front wheels of the tractor sharply when the farmer realizes that the row being planted is slightly off the desired line parallel to the adjacent, previously planted row. The sharp turn of the front wheels can have the desired effect of returning the tractor to the desired line. However, when a locked hitch is used, the planter and the chisel devices, planting seed and ripping the trenches behind the tractor, will move sharply in an opposite direction. This is because the tractor and the attachments pivot on the rear wheels when the front wheels turn sharply. This sharp movement of implements behind the tractor creates sharp deviations from the desired straight-line path in both the planted rows and the trenches.
The resulting deviations in the path of the planted rows and the trenches result in inefficiencies during subsequent cultivation and chemical application operations. When subsequent attempts are made to follow or track the trenches with the front wheels of a tractor pulling a cultivation device or a chemical application device, the deviations will cause the front wheels of the tractor to turn the front end of the tractor, thereby pivoting tightly hitched implements towed behind the tractor. Consequently, subsequent cultivation or chemical application carried out behind the tractor, well removed from the front wheels which track the trenches, will deviate from a straight-line path at a location in the planted rows which precedes the actual deviation in the planted rows corresponding with the deviation in the trenches. This can result in the destruction of the row crops by the cultivator blades, commonly known as "Cultivator Blight", or in the waste of chemicals applied to the unplanted space between the planted rows and a failure to treat areas of planted rows. Because sharp deviations are necessarily common, given the high degree of skill required to plant row crops in perfectly straight rows and to create perfectly straight trenches, farmers are required to spray pesticides and other chemicals in wider bands than might otherwise be required. Wide chemical application bands are required because the inconsistencies in the paths of the trenches cannot be easily tracked. In order to be sure each plant is treated, the width of the band where chemicals are applied must be widened in order to minimize the failures to treat areas of planted rows due to sharp deviations in the trenches and/or the path of the planted rows.
The present invention addresses these and other problems associated with the formation and use of trenches formed during planting operations to guide farm machinery engaged in cultivation and/or chemical application operations subsequent to the planting of row crops. The present invention also offers other advantages over the prior art, and solves other problems associated therewith.